The interwoven coaching staffs for Notre Dame football and Cincinnati

The Notre Dame football game against Cincinnati this weekend has a ton of storylines, including when it comes to each program’s coaching staff.

If there is one storyline that you need to prepare yourself for, it’s how Notre Dame football head coach Brian Kelly and defensive coordinator Marcus Freeman used to coach at Cincinnati. This is, of course, objectively true. You’ll often hear it through a lens of, “Do players want revenge,” or “Does this give one team a competitive advantage?”

It’s like people think that you can’t tell what a player’s strengths are on tape or that a team wouldn’t change their calls.

For fans, these are important stories. Players come and go, but coaches are supposed to stay. Good coaches, in particular, are expected to stay. For a program of Cincinnati’s caliber, they’ve become used to their coaches leaving them. Mark Dantonio, Brian Kelly, and Butch Jones all in a row.

Now, Bearcats fans are almost waiting for Luke Fickell to move on.

The rumors around him are constant, swirling, especially with USC (Where the AD who hired Fickell now works) is open. For fans of any G5 school, they want to prove that their coach is worse off for leaving them. UCF fans would love a shot at Nebraska and Scott Frost, same goes for Memphis fans and Mike Norvell at Florida State. Cincinnati fans, even if it’s over a decade later and doesn’t matter to the players, are getting that shot at Kelly.